It has been a long three weeks. The weight of your arm in the sling is hard on your neck and the exaggerated moves that you need to make being only one handed just make you tired by the end of the day.  Your body is just all out of kilter and it’s unnatural. Here’s a previous blog about all this:  https://sarasinart.net/2015/01/19/fitted-for-rotator-cuff-surgery-sling/

I have learned to type pretty quick with just one finger because the sling hand just doesn’t go to keyboard correctly. Also that hand doesn’t reach the mouse on the right side. I thought that would work, but no.  So I had to learn to mouse left handed. Even tho I’m left handed I’ve always used the mouse in my right hand and had to retrain my brain for the mouse on the left.

One of the worst things about this process was not being allowed to take showers for two full weeks after the surgery due to possible infection. The first time I could shower it felt like maybe water had just been discovered for the first time that morning!

It is good to be able to figure out how to cook real food,  cos PBJ is ok sometimes, lol, and prepared frozen dinners are filled with sodium and really not all that good.  Washing dishes is not much fun.  Of course washing dishes was not that much fun before, and now it just takes longer.

The weather has kept me in the house more than I would have liked and MaChatte thinks that it is pretty nice for me to be home so much. It is not good when the weatherman uses the word brutal but that’s the word for our weather lately. We can just be thankful that we aren’t under feet of snow the way some parts of the country are.

Next Wednesday the sling comes off. The shoulder will be stiff from being immobilized for so long and there will still be a lot of things I can’t do, like reach up. But then  I will  be able to start physical therapy and probably best of all,  be able to drive again!  When you’re used to being independent, that is rough, and 4 weeks is a long time.

I think the shoulder has healed the way the surgeon expected it to.  I followed my surgeon’s directions exactly, and hopefully this process can be over sooner than later. If you’re having this surgery, listen to your doctor!